Eulogy in Steel and Blood
by Alone in the Desert
Summary: Daja needs to reconcile her compassions regarding Ben. Rated for dark themes. Standalone


Eulogy in Steel and Blood

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Disclaimer: All characters and locations herein are the property of Tamora Pierce. Plot and actual written words owned by me. Written for the Dancing Dove's Second SFF Challenge.

People were dispersing. For over an hour, now, people had been dispersing. While the city officials had returned to the business of being important almost immediately after the execution, and the families of the victims had retreated to envelop themselves in their grief, several dozen of the city folk were taking their time. Of course, anyone who considered watching a man's flesh slowly devoured from his bones entertainment wouldn't rush to leave his graveside in peace.

Even murderers deserved peace, especially ones whose crimes burned on the fuel of their own torment. If misery loves company, maybe Ben's misery had been so great it forced itself out of his heart like some perverse tide to flood the hearts of others. Yet the ashes of his pyre had not seemed to augment the misery of those he's infected with his illness. Maybe they would go on, spilling the poison he'd planted in their hearts, spreading it like a malignant illness. Maybe it would go on spreading until it conquered the entire city, until only single, frayed threads remained of the rich tapestry of life woven of shops and homes, men and women.

If they had let him find peace, maybe that epidemic of decay could be forestalled. He was dead, after all, and no danger to the city. Only what he'd left behind was, the ghost of him, the ghost of his unhappiness and anguish. She could not have let him burn so long, suffer so much more. Would it atone for the death he had caused? How could it? It served no purpose, except to add weight to the scales of debt on either side. Who was to receive payment? Ben, or his victims? Who was owed this tremendous sum in the balance sheets of life?

She could have said that something here was not right, but it would not be true. _Nothing_ here was right, and the volume of the wrongness pressed like rushing wind in her ears, and she had no idea how to fix it. She could not melt the slag of a man's being and reform it, whole and functional, free of cracks. She could not strengthen the weaknesses in his character like she strengthened uneven wire, nor grease the nooks of his mind like a squeaking hinge. She had quickened his end, at least. She could not believe that he deserved the extra punishment, not when he'd been punished before he'd ever committed any crime. Was there nothing else she could do? Not even an armless gesture of sympathy, of understanding?

Polyam had once told her that sympathy was a lie unless offered by someone who'd known suffering themselves. How would you feel, she asked, if I told you I understand what it was like for you, being orphaned and cast away, alone in the world? Exactly, she'd continued, so don't try to tell me you know what it's like to lose a leg and a living all in one. Dare she say she understood, even to his ashes? She'd never felt that need to make others feel her pain, to _force_ them to understand. Dare she offer him something else? Could she walk up to the ashes of his pyre, in solitude, when no one else could watch, and say, I _don't_ know what it was like for you, but I wish there was something I could've done?

She did wish there was something like that. She had hoped to the last, deep down, that maybe it was not true, that maybe it wasn't as bad as it looked. She had restrained herself from falling to her knees, from begging the gods to say it wasn't so. That there should be one man, a good man, a hero, who she could freely admire and respect and… And yes, love. She had thought Ben could be that man, had basked when he so obviously regarded her well, respected her, even found affection for her. She had found it hard to believe. Children who could exceed their elders were the source of awe and fear, not love nor tenderness. Ben had never wanted her to be less than she could be. On the contrary, something about him just urged her to better herself, to do her absolute best, for him. Smith work was not as prosaic as most thought; she needed a muse, too.

The winter's afternoon dusk was falling swift and heavy, like the silent, smothering snows of this land. She'd thought to return before dark, but dismissed those thoughts as she walked closer and closer to his pyre, finally alone. The city dwellers would not understand. They saw randomness and cruelty where she saw a tumor of the heart, a disease of that left them both helpless and far apart from each other. Polyam's words of long ago resounded. The man who settled for nothing less demanded her very best. He was dead, he reminded her, and would never again see her handle her own work.

Luckily, she always carried items of her own manufacture. Brass buttons glinted at her cuffs, but they were mute. Hooks and buckles were likewise silent. Something deeper down screamed at her, demanding her attention. A knot twisted deep in her stomach, spreading all within her. She shut her eyes tightly and felt for the metal, scented for it. Her ears caught the whisper of steel against steel, and she opened her eyes. She could show her respect and also help the city by sealing in the disease, purifying the epidemic at its source, the man whose ashes were heaped before her. A shield and a scouring, both sealed by blood squeezed out of a lacerated palm. A dagger dropped, not for magic or ceremony, but just because she couldn't bear to keep it. It was still shiningly polished and fully formed when she walked away, leaving it among the heavy iron shackles that had been molten out of shape.


End file.
